The Rodeo Star's Return (Sapphire Springs Book 1)

by Angie Campbell

  “So, tell her all that, too,” Mark replied, throwing his hands up.

  Brock shook his head, and plopped down on the couch. “Not until she tells me how she feels.”

  Mark chuckled low and shook his head. “You know, you could tell her how you feel first.”

  “I don’t…”

  Tyler, who hadn’t been paying much attention for the last several seconds anyway, interrupted before he could finish his thought. “I’m going to go see what’s taking so long,” Tyler grumbled, heading for the door.

  “Whoa there,” Zane said, grabbing him by the arm. “You stay here. I’ll go see what’s going on. Your liable to scare someone in your state.”

  Tyler glared at Zane, gave the door another glance, then sighed and plopped down beside Brock. “Fine, if you think it’s for the best.”

  “Yeah, it’s definitely for the best,” Zane replied, patting him on the shoulder before turning back to the door. “He’ll have people screaming and running for the nearest exit with that wild look of his,” he whispered to Mark as he left the room.

  “Just hurry, please,” Tyler hollered from behind him.

  He poked his head back in the door to answer, “Sure, thing.” Then he turned to Mark and Phillip. “Try to keep him calm.”

  “Which one?” Phillip laughed.

  Glancing at the gloomy pair on the couch, Zane shook his head and laughed. “Both of them.”

  “Just try to hurry,” Phillip sighed. “And if you see James, send him this way. If nothing else, maybe he and Mark can form a barricade to keep Tyler in here.”

  “Will do,” he answered, finally heading down the hall. When he reached his parents room, he knocked on the door and waited for someone to answer.

  Mary Ellen opened the door only far enough to stick her head out. “Yeah?” she glared.

  “Well, hello to you, too.” She just continued to glare at him, not saying a word. “You do realize you’re making the poor schmuck miserable, don’t you?”

  “Well, that’s the schmuck’s fault. Not mine,” she snapped. Zane just chuckled and shook his head at her. “What do you want, Zane?” she asked through her teeth, making his name sound like a dirty word.

  “The groom wanted to know how much longer before we can start.”

  Mary Ellen turned to look back in the room when she heard her name called from behind her. When she turned back to Zane, she managed a small smile. “If you’ll go get her dad and inform Pastor Macy, we can start now.”

  “Good,” he nodded. “We weren’t going to keep him from marching down here himself for much longer. He’s so nervous, he’s making me jittery.”

  *******

  When Tyler finally heard Pastor Macy say, “I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss your bride,” he breathed a sigh of relief and smiled down at her. He had been terrified she was going to change her mind at the last second, and leave him standing at the altar with his heart in his hands. It didn’t matter that she still didn’t know how he really felt about her. It still would have crushed him.

  He gently wrapped his big hand around the back of her neck and pulled her close. He heard his beautiful, blushing bride gasp when he grabbed her around the waist and brought his mouth down to kiss her. It made him wonder if she thought he was planning on making it a quick kiss. If that’s what she had been thinking, she was completely wrong. He planned on taking total advantage of his church sanctioned right to kiss her in front of God, and everybody else, too.

  By the time he let her up for air, she was swaying in his arms like she might faint, and she had a death grip on his dress shirt. If it hadn’t been for the hollering and whistling from the wedding guest, he wouldn’t have stopped when he did. As it were, he was thinking of giving in, and kissing her again, and just saying the heck with all the guest. She was looking at him like she was a little awestruck. He wouldn’t be a bit surprised to find no one had ever kissed her the way she truly deserved. That was okay. That was finally his job now, and he would make sure to do his best to make up for all the lost time.

  He was still staring down into her eyes, and might have continued to do so indefinitely if he hadn’t heard Pastor Macy clear his throat, then whisper, “Are you two ready to continue?”

  Tyler watched Lucy’s cheeks start to glow prettily, before turning to the other man. “Yeah, Pastor Macy. Sorry.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about,” he chuckled, turning the couple to face their friends and family. “Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce to you, for the first time, Mr. and Mrs. Tyler Wentworth.”

  By the time all the whistling and hollering had died down once again, she was over her embarrassment, and smiling up at him. Of course, he should have realized that was what Zane was waiting for, before opening his big mouth.

  “There for a second, I wasn’t sure you were going to let her up for air until she passed out on you.”

  His sister, Lisa, and their mother, both reached up to smack him in the back of the head at the same time, causing a collective laugh from the assembled wedding guest. Zane just grinned bigger, and sure enough Lucy’s cheeks lit up like the fourth of July.

  “Zane, can you, please, hold off on the embarrassing comments for the day?”

  “Tyler, you know as well as the rest of us, if he tries to hold all of that in, he’ll start popping blood vessels, or something,” Mark smirked. “I think it’s pretty much a lost cause.”

  “Besides, I think he’s right,” Taylor added. “I think the only reason he stopped when he did, is because Pastor Macy stopped him.”

  “Young Lady,” Lena Wentworth said, wagging her finger at her daughter. “You’re as bad as Zane. I think I let you hang out with the boys too much growing up.”

  “Well, the boys were more fun to hang out with. They climbed trees and went fishing.”

  “Okay,” Carl jumped in, literally jumping up from his folding chair and causing it to fold up. “Before this goes any farther, and takes a bad turn, let’s get these folding chairs moved out of the way, so we can move the tables out. Then we can start the grilling. I’m sure the charcoal is hot enough to go by now.”

  Chapter 12 – Friday, June 28

  Tyler and Lucy had been married six weeks now, and he hadn’t worked up the nerve enough to do more than kiss her. Something he managed to do before he’d even asked her to marry him. He was going crazy, living in the same house with her, but not being able to touch her. He wasn’t sure how much more he could take of this form of torture before he snapped and tossed her over his shoulder like some long dead caveman.

  The whole house smelled like her. The towels and the sheets. Even his own clothes. It probably had something to do with the fact that she wouldn’t let him do the laundry. Not even his own. He wasn’t sure what she was afraid of, but there had to be a reason other than thinking he was going to mess something up. At least she let him do the dishes and vacuum. He didn’t feel totally useless. He’d be grateful when they were able to start breaking ground on the new house. He could use the physical labor of building a house to working off some of this pent-up energy.

  He’d taken Zane’s advice about talking to his father about that land he was wanting to sell. He’d ended up buying that and a chunk from both Brian Tagert and the Lewis’. The way it worked out, all the property was connected.

  That brought him to the other reason everything smelled like her. They were temporarily living in her apartment. The furniture even smelled like her. That was why he was now at the grocery store, trying to find everything she had written down on her list. He’d had to get out of the house before he did something crazy.

  He had his head down, trying to figure out which aisles he needed to go down next to finish finding the rest of the thing’s on Lucy’s grocery list. He had been concentrating, and was unaware that someone had entered the aisle with him. When he felt the tip of a fingernail run across the back of his t-shirt, he jumped so hard, he about came out of his cowboy boots, and his cowboy ha
t slid off and landed in his hands. When he turned around, it was to find Brandy Drake standing there.

  He gave her a disgusted look, and nearly spit at her. “What are you doing? Don’t ever touch me.” The last thing he needed was for somebody to see him with the town troublemaker. If it got back to Lucy, there was no telling what kind of problems it could cause.

  “Hey, come on. Don’t be that way,” she pouted. It made her look more like a fish, than sexy.

  “Why don’t you just go on about your business?” he asked, shooing her away. “I don’t even want to talk to you.”

  “What are you afraid of?” she smirked. “That you’ll give into a real woman? You’re bound to need one, being married to the little science nerd.”

  “Lucy is twice the woman you are,” he snarled.

  “Yeah, she’s at least twice my size,” she shuddered. “Why would you have married someone so fat?”

  “Lucy’s not fat,” he huffed. “That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

  “Maybe,” she smirked. “But I know I can get her to believe that’s exactly what you meant.”

  “Stay away from my wife,” he snarled, taking a menacing step forward.

  “You can’t hardly stop me from talking to an old friend.”

  “You have never truly been her friend.”

  She shrugged, giving him a predatory look. “So, she doesn’t know that.”

  “Just stay away from both of us.”

  When he tried to walk away, she stopped him, again. “You know, you didn’t have to marry the fat chick in town to get a mother for your kid. I would have married you.”

  “I’m going to say this once more. Lucy is not fat. I married Lucy because I wanted to marry Lucy. I’ve always wanted to marry Lucy. She is a far better woman than you have ever thought about being. And last of all, I would not have married you, had you been the only choice available. I would have stayed single, and raised my daughter on my own. I don’t think you need to even be anywhere near children. Now, leave me alone.”

  “Whatever,” she huffed. “You’re obviously not as smart as I thought you were.” She gave him a disgusted look, and finally turned to leave.

  Tyler just stood there and shook his head at her. “Man, that woman is messed up,” he mumbled to himself.

  “Yeah, she is,” Joe Harris said from behind him, causing him to jump hard enough for the second time, in less than five minutes, to lose his cowboy hat.

  He jammed his hat back on his head and put his hand over his heart. “You startled me.”

  “Sorry, but you need to keep an eye on that one. She’s bound to try and cause trouble. And it’s her mother that messed her up.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it,” he agreed, then gave the man a strange look. “What do you mean, her mother messed her up?”

  “Well, all I really know is, one time when Brandy was still just in her early teens, she was in here with her mother. She couldn’t have been more than fourteen. You know how thin she was back then,” he said, not wanting to insult the young woman behind her back. “She asked her mother if they could get the stuff to make chocolate chip cookies. Her mother started in on her about how cookies were bad for her, and would cause her to gain weight. She went on to tell her she needed to lose a few pounds already.”

  “That woman has never needed to lose weight. Gain a few pounds, yes. Lose a few, never. She’s always been way too skinny.”

  “Like I said.” Joe nodded his head sagely, “Her mother messed her up.”

  *******

  Tyler had just finished putting the groceries away when Lucy walked in the kitchen, causing him to nearly swallow his tongue. “Oh, hi. I didn’t realize you were back from the store already,” she said, a little nervous shake in her voice. “Did you manage to find everything?”

  “Yeah,” he grunted, silently praying she’d lose the towel she had wrapped around herself. She had obviously just gotten out of the shower. Her hair was piled on top of her head, and strands of it had escaped and were sticking to the side of her neck.

  “Are you okay, Tyler?” she asked, sounding concerned.

  “Uh-huh,” he mumbled, slowly nodding his head up and down.

  She raised an eyebrow at him, wondering what he was thinking. “Mr. Henry called. He said he located Montana’s birth mother, and she’s already signed the papers.”

  “That’s great,” he said, sounding a little more normal for a few seconds.

  “She’s officially, legally ours. She can’t come back and try to take her back, now. Well, officially, once the papers are filed. He said it won’t take long.”

  “Thank God,” he sighed with relief. “I’m glad that’s over.”

  “He said, once he explained what the papers were, she never even hesitated. As a matter of fact, he said she mumbled something about, good riddance.”

  “Yeah, she was worthless as a mother.”

  “Sounds like it.”

  “Where is our little angel, anyway? Has Mom brought her home yet?”

  “Uh, no,” Lucy said, side stepping around him, deciding she needed a cup of coffee, really more to keep her hands busy, than for the caffeine. She busied herself getting the coffee maker ready. “She called and asked if she could keep her overnight, and bring her home tomorrow afternoon. I told her that was fine. It is okay, isn’t?”

  “Of course, that’s fine. I’ll miss the little angel, but she is my mother,” he grinned. “Why wouldn’t it be okay?”

  “After I told her it was okay, I started wondering if it would be okay for me to make that kind of decision,” she answered without turning to face him. “I was afraid you might be mad.”

  “Lucy, you may not have given birth to her, but you are her mother,” he said, walking up closer behind her so he could wrap his hands around her arms. “The only time you need to talk to me before making a decision, is if you believe it’s a decision we need to make together. Like if it’s something big that we need to talk over.”

  “Oh,” she said, sounding like she had tears in her eyes.

  “You do realize, I’d be fine with your mother keeping her overnight if she wanted.”

  “Really?” she turned to look at him, somewhat surprised. She had to make a grab for her towel and re-tuck it, when it brushed against him and came undone.

  “Well, yeah,” he grinned. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “I don’t know,” she shrugged, having to grab her towel again when it started to slip. She turned red, and turned back around to hide her embarrassment as she fixed her towel again. She missed it when his eyes glazed over with passion. “I just wasn’t sure, that’s all,” she finished, going back to her coffee preparations.

  “I figure, she’d be in good hands. After all, your parents did a wonderful job with you,” he said, swallowing hard. He was staring at her towel again, back to praying she’d lose it. “Besides that, our marriage makes her their grandchild, too.”

  “Yeah, that’s true,” she agreed, reaching up, without thinking, to grab a coffee cup. Her towel finally came loose, and dropped to the floor at her feet, before she could stop it.

  She heard Tyler groan a split second before she found herself picked up off the floor and cradled in his arms. He buried his face against her neck and growled. “I can’t wait any longer. I need to touch you,” he said, leaving the kitchen to head down the hall toward the bedroom. She never got that cup of coffee she had been trying to make.

  Chapter 13 – Tuesday, July 2

  Lucy entered the Honeysuckle Inn restaurant, where she had made arrangements to meet Jenny, Jessie and Mary Ellen when they discovered the Sapphire Café was already packed with their regular lunch crowd. Since it was only fifteen after twelve, most of the tables here were already full, but thankfully the other three were already waiting on her at a corner table by a window, and looked to be deep in conversation.

  Their conversation came to a sudden stop when she pulled out the one empty chair at their table, and plopped down
in it with a heavy sigh. She dropped her head in her hands, doing her best not to cry.

  “What’s wrong, Sweetie? Why’d you call all of us for an emergency lunch meeting?” Jenny asked, pulling her hands away from her face.

  She sniffled and swiped a tear away with the tips of her fingers. She shrugged, quickly looking up at the other women, then away. “I don’t know what to do.”

  Jessie frowned and shook her head. “What do you mean, you don’t know what to do? I thought you said losing your towel in front of him worked.”

  “It did, but he hasn’t touched me since. I would think he would need it more than once every few weeks, wouldn’t he?”

  “That’s always been the impression I got,” Mary Ellen agreed. “The way they talk about it, you would think they were going to die if they had to go more than eight hours without it.”

  “Mary Ellen, that’s not helping,” Jenny sighed.

  “The general attitude of men toward sex, doesn’t mean he doesn’t want you,” Mary Ellen said quickly with a grimace, trying to correct her mistake.

  “It doesn’t feel like he wants me,” Lucy sniffled again.

  “Hun, this is all new to Tyler, too,” Jessie added.

  “No, it’s not,” she said, shaking her head.

  “What do you mean?” Jenny asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

  “That wasn’t the first time he had… Well, you know,” she said, looking at them like they had all lost their minds.

  “What are you talking about?” Jenny frowned.

  “He has a baby, remember?”

  “Oh, that,” Jenny chuckled and shook her head. “That’s not what Jessie was talking about.”

  “Well, what did she mean then?”

  “She’s talking about being married, and in a relationship.”

  She shook her head and stated adamantly, “Our being intimate one time does not make this a relationship.”